THE ISTHMUS OF PANAMA. 153 



in the railroad, and when platform cars were put on 

 the track for moving stone and timber, they evi- 

 dently, for some time, considered it the ultimatum 

 of the great wonder, and would often get their friends 

 together from a distance, and shove them over the 

 road as far as the track was laid ; but one day I wit- 

 nessed a scene of astonishment to be equalled only 

 on communicating to them the fact, that rain falls 

 in the United States, for a part of the year, in light 

 flakes, and covers the earth white; and that the 

 rivers become solid, so that men and horses can tra- 

 vel over them. A party was assembled, when a com- 

 panion who had been at Navy Bay and seen a loco- 

 motive and the passenger cars, commenced a descrip- 

 tion, which if as expressive in language as it was in 

 gestures, as he described the motions of the engine, 

 and depicted the sounds of escaping steam, and its 

 velocity, it certainly must have conveyed a very ac- 

 curate impression of its character; that it did, I 

 have reason to believe, from the fact that the plat- 

 form cars were henceforth abandoned, and treated 

 as things of the least possible consequence. 



